Setsuna (Suna IV)
by Suna
Summary: The bittersweet end to the tale of Suna (Sailor Pluto)


She woke in a cold sweat. She didn't sit up or even open her eyes.   
Instead she committed to memory the dream she'd just had. The ship was   
there, its lines still the same despite hundreds of years of travel.   
Its shiny hull was marred by the scarring blasts of energy which disabled   
it, sending it on its fiery trek into oblivion. The stars were rendered   
invisible by the actinic glow of the crystal drive, propelling the vessel   
and its crew ever faster and faster. Setsuna had seen all this and more:   
The ship hanging motionless, as if suspended in time. Her own feet on the   
deck of a familiar ship. The feeling of power surging through her aged body.   
This same scene she'd seen a dozen times.   
  
It was what gave her hope.  
  
Reflexively, Setsuna turned to look at her husband's side of the bed.   
He wasn't there of course and hadn't been for a long time. But habits  
centuries old were hard to break even after the death of a beloved.   
The soft rays of dawn shone through the open window. Sweet scented air  
wafted into the room. The cool tile felt refreshing beneath her feet as   
she padded to the mirror. She brushed her green tresses and looked  
reflectively at her countenance. There were new lines that hadn't been   
there a century ago and she wasn't twenty anymore, or even a thousand.  
Still, time had not been unkind to her. She smiled ruefully. Or perhaps   
time had been the cruelest of all to her. Her hair properly behaved,  
she stood and began to dress. It was the five hundred and twenty fifth   
year of the reign of Crystal Tokyo, and Sailor Pluto had begun her day.  
  
***  
  
"Isn't it great news?" the young man said, his eyes shining with an  
eager glow. His expression faltered slightly at Setsuna's expressionless  
stare. "I mean," he continued, "We can go faster than light! With this  
kind of drive we can go anywhere. Faster than Starlights." The pregnant  
pause saw the smile completely disappear from his face. "Well," he coughed  
embarassedly, "I just thought you'd want to know." He turned and briskly   
walked down the path back out of the park. The milky globe of Pluto's moon,  
Charon, filled half the clear, dark sky through the dome.   
  
Setsuna's heart was still smarting from the event. So Ami's group had   
finally done it. They had mastered the ability to move a ship faster than  
light, something no human had ever managed to do. It was a shame that  
the pretty scientist had not lived to see the project reach fruition.  
But the pain was double. She's seen the same light as in the messenger's  
eyes, not far away but ages ago. Cursedly clear memories replayed the moment  
she'd learned of the first time mankind had tried to reach the stars harnessing  
the limitless power of the Crystal Drive. And then her mind's eye saw the flash   
of light which forever sealed her previous life from this one.  
  
A high pitched scream shook her from her revery. Looking anxiously about,   
the tall woman broke into a smile when she discovered the cause. Five little  
children, bouncing around in the low gravity, were playing a game of tickle-tag,  
and one of them had been quite thoroughly made It.  
  
Setsuna shook her head, her hair billowing. *This is good news,* she reminded  
herself. *It's what I've been waiting for, after all.*  
  
Expertly she bounded across the park. Within minutes she was at the spaceport,   
which bore her namesake, booking passage to Earth.  
  
***  
  
If there was anything the diverse group of Earthers constructing the largest   
ship ever made had in common, it was the way they reacted towards her.   
Truth be told, it was getting annoying. Every one of them had a sort of   
fearful awe. Their faces all said the same thing: *The old Senshi's had a   
prophecy* Setsuna had to admit it did keep them moving quickly and the cynic   
in her also had to concede that she'd gotten used to deference, but this was   
just ridiculous. Still, the only way to avoid it was to stop making   
appearances at the construction site, high above the moon. *I'm becoming an   
old lady* she chided herself. *I stare at the towers of the moon until I get   
tired of them, and then I flutter about the Haruka and make them nervous.   
Best I stay back and just act silently mysterious*   
  
Three years had come and gone since Setsuna made this giant station her more   
or less permanent home. Occasionally she flitted to the moon or to Crystal   
Tokyo to make plans or simply to escape for a short while. Inevitably she   
ended back in her castle in the sky, overseeing the construction of this   
one of a kind vessel.  
  
She sat at the edge of the couch and stared through the picture window at   
the giant skeleton of a vessel, the stars still visible through empty   
portions of the frame. Haruka was a fitting name. It meant distant in   
Japanese, the tongue of the ruling family, and that of the country in which   
she'd lived much of the more momentous times in her life. Even her own name,   
adopted upon descending to Earth after thousands of years of self-imposed exile,   
was Japanese. Of course the ship's name was far more than just a fitting   
adjective. It was a memorial to one of her best friends.  
  
Setsuna spent several minutes watching the tiny figures clamber over the hull   
of the ship. *Her* ship. Finally she looked down into her lap at the   
3528 Fall Fashion Catalog and leafed through its pages meditatively.   
  
***  
  
"You may enter."  
  
The words echoed impressively as they always did. One would expect no less   
from the Queen of the Solar System. Not for 30,000 years had one held that   
title nor had the seat of power even been the world which had spawned humanity   
and served as its land of rebirth.  
  
The chamber was similarly impressive, resplendent in its austerity. The   
irridescent crystal walls glistened with barely pent energy. The vaulted   
ceilings were lost in an impenetrable mist. And there, out of sight here   
in the giant reception room, but pulsing with the regularity of Suna's heart,   
resided the other doorway--the one she'd passed through a thousand years ago,   
chasing a laughing girl with pink tresses who was heedless of the dangers of   
the corridors she trod.  
  
"Rise, Setsuna."  
  
The voice of the Queen was the same as it had been thousands of years ago.   
Souls travelled a narrow path in the cyclic road of the Moon Kingdom. The   
dress, too, was the same, as were the two rivers of hair flowing from the sides   
of Her Majesty's head. She was beautiful after all of these years. But that   
too was not surprising. Their's was a long lived breed.  
  
Setsuna lifted herself from her knees to look almost eye to eye with the seated   
monarch. "I thank you for granting me this audience." Self control kept her   
from adding "final" to that statement.  
  
Queen Serenity nodded, her face impassive.   
  
"Your majesty, I wish to take leave of my duties." The chamber echoed hollowly   
with her proclamation, snatching them from her throat as she uttered it.  
  
The Queen cocked her head to the side, "This is a sudden move is it not?"  
  
"It is something I have contemplated for a long time."  
  
The seated woman was silent for a moment. Then, "Have you thoughts as to a   
replacement?"  
  
Setsuna swallowed. "I have not, but fate tends to take care of such things."   
  
Queen Serenity stared into Setsuna, her eyes neither accusing nor sympathetic.   
Finally she nodded. The silence extended, grew uncomfortable.  
  
The green tressed woman bowed awkwardly and managed to say, "By your leave,"   
before turning.  
  
"Wait... please." The Queen's voice was soft now, almost a whisper. Setsuna   
turned to face her monarch, vision blurred by tears. "It's him, isn't it? Well."   
The woman who was soon to no longer be Sailor Pluto thought she heard the barest   
quaver in her sovereign's voice. "Well, it has been long enough hasn't it?"  
  
Setsuna nodded, her breath catching, tears sliding unheedingly down her cheeks.   
Again silence stretched eternally in the vast chamber.  
  
"Puu." Setsuna's eyes jerked to focus on Queen Serenity's at the vocalisation of   
that old name. Her Queen was tearful too. "Puu, you know my mother would done   
whatever she could to save him."  
  
Setsuna quirked her lips in the barest smile, "She never would have survived."  
  
Queen Serenity's deep red eyes held Setsuna fixed. "You never quite believed   
in her, did you?" she said slowly. Setsuna looked down, unable to return the gaze.   
The floor mirrored her face, flushed and wet.  
  
"You have my leave," the iron was back in Her Majesty's voice. Setsuna turned   
and did not look back, but felt the pink haired queen's accusing eyes on her back   
the entire journey out of the palace.  
  
***  
  
The ship's officers gathered around the large table, attentive to their Captain. As  
tradition demanded, he was bearded but the beard was short and his appearance young.  
While that could have been an affectation--people could look as young as they wanted  
these days, a ship's captain tended to cultivate an air of maturity. Odds were he  
really was in the first flush of youth. Upon further reflection, Setsuna noted that  
all of the ship's officers, with the exception of the Medical Officer were inordinately  
young. *Or perhaps I'm gauging things relatively* she thought ruefully to herself.  
  
The captain gave his First Officer a meaningful glance. From the looks they'd exchanged  
in earlier encounters it was clear the two had a relationship. Nothing against regulations  
of course, just another oddity on this far from usual vessel.  
  
"I see we're all present. Let's begin," The Captain's voice was easy, affable. Behind  
him a tri-dimensional display expanded. On it were the trajectories of two objects--  
the Haruka and the Artemis.  
  
"We've all done the drill, now we just need to get the timing right in practice. The  
Haruka will jump out of hyperspace here, " A glowing graphic lit to indicate a piece of  
space no different from any other. "Afterwards, we'll have a window of 60 seconds to  
catch the Artemis. She's in a stable trajectory because her drive's been off for   
millenia. Still, she's moving like a bat out of hell and we won't have a fraction of  
her speed when we translate to normal space. Of course, that's where our esteemed guest  
comes in." He smiled at Setsuna who returned the gesture with the barest nod of her head.  
Unperturbed, the captain continued, "Dunnells, you'll need to keep us aligned just right  
for docking. Burnett, you'll monitor and store all communications. For them it's been  
just a few days. There will be some, I assure you. Suna, you'll have the biggest job  
of all, of course."  
  
Setsuna looked again at the woman who bore her old name. One could not tell if there  
was a relation, so many generations had passed since she'd borne her only child. But  
there was a familiar restiveness and eagerness to perform in the pert features beneath the  
blue braided hair.  
  
The Executive Officer was speaking now. A short woman, she spoke with curt authority,  
"We drop out in five hours and thirty minutes. Take care of your food and other bodily  
requirements now. Be back on duty at 23:00. Dismissed."  
  
As the officers filed out of the briefing room's open door, the Captain stopped next to  
Setsuna. He looked at her with what was perhaps a comforting expression. Setsuna  
looked eye to eye at the young man. "Sailor Pluto," he said softly, "My ship and my crew  
will get your Artemis back." Setsuna blinked. Surprisingly she felt reassured. There  
was confidence in Captain Kereldin's green eyes. She nodded again and smiled slightly.  
Satisfied, the Captain sidled out the door. Setsuna heard it close behind her as she  
stared at the display, at the meeting points of the two brightly colored lines.  
  
***  
  
"Time to translation," the soft voice of the Second Officer called out.  
  
"Five minutes, three seconds." called out the young Lieutenant with the flaming red hair  
seated in front of the Captain.  
  
Second Officer Lutz was in charge of the translation event and seemed to have circumstances  
in hand with constant status reports from bridge crew and associated stations throughout  
the ship. Setsuna smiled inwardly. The young man did *not* quite know how to deal with  
thousand year old dignitaries. Alternately stiff and overly unctuous, the young man  
managed to flush red at least five times to her counting--no easy feat on his brown  
features.  
  
The crew were all performing admirably considering what was coming. Still she could see  
the tensed shoulders and nervous glances. The Morale Officer looked at her nervously  
once, her face unsuited to frowns but weighed by one of the largest. The old Medical  
Officer was conspicuously absent from the group.  
  
The Captain nodded his head at her and Setsuna closed her eyes. The busy displays and  
lights of the bridge disappeared leaving only her thoughts to distract her. One by one  
she eliminated their tugging influence. Her fears, anxieties all fell away, leaving  
a curiously pleasant void. The sensation of the heavy staff on her lap faded.  
Last to disappear was her sensation of the ship's gravity, itself an odd pleasure so   
different from the acceleration induced gravity of the other ships she'd ridden. At last   
she was alone, floating undisturbed in her own space and time.  
  
As if from light years away she heard the Mr. Lutz's voice counting down from twenty.   
At three seconds she heard discordant klaxons sound and then a young man's voice shouting,  
"Translation, sir!" Setsuna clutched the staff in her hand. The familiar bond between  
the garnet at its head and the rose of her heart reforged in a moment.   
  
Setuna's eyes opened. Coming to her feet amongs the shifting forces of the ship settling  
into reality she stretched out her hands, her staff towering above her. From the depths of  
her soul she called,   
  
"TIME STOP!"  
  
A thousand waves pummeled her at once. She was a strand of seaweed in a tempest holding  
onto the staff for dear life. Heedless of the scrambling figures around her she   
struggled to just to maintain conciousness. The displays all showed zero time passage  
and the crew was quick to report the fact, but Sailor Pluto could pay them little mind.  
Slowly, painfully she manipulated the forces of temporality into submission, creating a  
stable eye in the midst of the vortex. She fell to her knees but it was not defeat but  
simply the anchoring of a fisherman against the bucking of an unhappy catch.  
  
The Captain stared frankly at her, waiting for some sort of signal. "Go," she hissed."   
"Dock while we have time." She was too spent to appreciate the irony in her words.   
As if turned on by a switch, Captain Kereldin was himself again, snapping out stacatto  
orders and turning the ship into a blizzard of activity.  
  
The other storm, the one she had created abated as quickly as it began, now rendered docile   
by Sailor Pluto's steady hand. Setsuna lay back on the cool deck of the bridge, soft lights  
glowing blue above her. The hardest part was done. Now all that was left was to stay alive   
long enough for the crew of the Artemis to be saved.  
  
Her green hair spilling out over the floor, the aged senshi thought sadly to herself  
*All this time. All this waiting. And you'll never get to see who you've been  
waiting for all of this time. But then it's not you who has been waiting.* For the  
hundredth time on the journey she tried to summon Tiluri's face to mind. Again  
she found she could not. Only memories of those she had left behind. Her husband,  
long dead. The Senshi. Her dear friends Hotaru, Michiru, and Haruka. And of course  
Chibi-Usa. Queen Serenity would always be a Small Lady in Setsuna's heart. She smiled  
at that, though Setsuna could not tell if the smile actually made it to her lips.  
  
Sailor Pluto felt the strength ebbing from her tired old/young flesh and wished  
only that she could not be alone at this hour of departure.  
  
***  
  
"Hang on tight, boys." Suna deftly played the controls of the shuttle like an accordion  
and grinned mischievously at the trio of space-sick crewmen in seats behind her. Jets  
of flame shot from the oblong cargo carrier as the young Lieutenant maneuvered the ship to   
a docking with the Artemis. A pale glow suffused the whole scene lending an odd ethereal  
quality to the proceedings. It was easy to dock with something that didn't move, however.  
The shuttle clanged softly with impact and the port screens were completely obscured by the  
hull of the erstwhile Flying Dutchman.  
  
"All right. Justin, John, get in there and get that crew into our hold." Her braid danced   
lazily in weightlessness as she gestured. The two saluted and dogged their helmets. A  
moment later they were out the airlock and in the Artemis, their suit cameras relaying their  
progress.  
  
Suna watched, fascinated. One by one the members of the Artemis crew were rounded up  
and fed into the waiting shuttle. She fingered her braid nervously. Time was running out  
and the Second Officer was sending increasingly insistent commands to the Away Team.  
She breathed a sigh of relief when the last of them was gathered from what was left of the   
bridge of the Artemis. Within minutes, what was left of the crew of the doomed ship had   
been transferred to the hold of her little ship.  
  
"That's all of them, ma'am," the polite voice of Spacer Johnston spoke from Suna's console.  
Automatically, she released the grapples and fired a tongue of flame at the Artemis to  
break contact. Punching in the course back to the Haruka, Suna saw the pale glow suddenly  
disappear and the Artemis disappear in an instant. Unseen hands grabbed her heart and her  
vision faded. Gasping for breath, she slowly clawed her way back to conciousness.  
  
Suna opened her eyes to the glittering starfield, the Haruka a point of light slightly  
brighter than the rest. *She's gone.* she thought, with a tinge of regret. Suna   
activated the autopilot and stared at console.  
  
A tapping at the cabin door brought her from her reverie. The door opened and Suna  
saw two figures emerge into the room. One was Spacer Glass, the other was dressed  
in the blue uniform of the Artemis. His brown hair was unruly and his blue eyes glittered  
earnestly.  
  
"Ma'am, Lieutenant Tiluri Sarteen, Helsman, Senior surviving officer of the Artemis."  
  
Suna's eyes focused on his face, her heart thudding loudly in her ears.  
  
*I know you* she thought.  
  
FINIS 


End file.
